This week, Catching the Comet's Tail features author Rosie Fiore. Her second novel, Wonder Women, is a brilliantly observed, multi-layered story about three women at a crossroads in their lives. Through her engaging, realistic cast of characters, Fiore tackles important issues such as motherhood, marriage, female friendship and ambition. Rosie has two children and is addicted to coffee; she is, therefore, my kind of woman. I suspect she may be yours too.
Rosie on creativity and the creative process...
"It's a funny old thing for me, the process of creating... a combination of sheer drudge and moments of breath-taking inspiration. But the best way I can describe it is as a slow, endless percolation of ideas, experiences, things you've heard. It's that percolation that slowly knits itself into stories. Sometimes it's clear which elements have led to which stories, sometimes it's not, and then it's as surprising to me as it would be to a reader. I always imagine my mind as a pond (I know... go with me). I dip my hand in and swirl it around, and when I am lucky, I hook a thread with a single finger. If I pull slowly and carefully and well, the whole net of the story will rise beautifully to the surface. It's in there. I just need to let it come."
Was creativity encouraged in you as a child and who were your early inspirations?
"My father painted and played the piano, my mum was wonderful with languages, and we were all encouraged to pursue our interests and grow. They were hugely supportive. My parents (and to a certain extent, my teachers at school), recognised me as a writer long before I did myself. I wanted to be an actor. I found writing to solitary and even though I knew I had a talent for it, I shied away from it for years.
I had to argue quite hard to get the chance to study drama at university, not because my parents didn't support it, but because they wanted me to be able to earn a living. But I did get to go, and found the Drama Department at Wits University a fertile and exciting creative playground, I learned so much there, and I am proud to number many people from my years there as close friends. Creative giants all of them."
How long did it take to write Wonder Women and can you recall the first spark of inspiration?
"Wonder Women is my fifth book, and was definitely the easiest to write. The first draft simply poured out. I couldn't type fast enough to get it down. It took the first five months of last year, and then I spent the second half of 2012, revising it with my agent and editor. I came up with the idea on the day I finished Babies in Waiting, because the themes of women balancing work and family made it such a logical follow on from the plot of Babies.
I knew which issues I wanted to cover in the book, and before I began, had a clear idea of my main characters, but as always, as I wrote and they developed and gained detail, they took some slightly different routes. Charlotte van Wijk, who edited the manuscript, gave wonderful advice in the later drafts on fleshing out some of the relationships, and making them much stronger.
When is a book finished? Finishing is always the hardest thing to do. I really don't like stories where all the ends are neatly tied up. I like to suggest some possibilities, but keep the options open. A few reviewers have said they felt Wonder Women needed another chapter, but it was very much my intention to leave all the characters with choices and allow the reader to decide what they thought might happen. I'm not one for a "happily ever after" scenario."
Who, what or where always inspires your creativity and what, if anything, blocks it?
"Coffee. Coffee is my friend, Seriously, I am badly addicted. It began when my small son was a baby who didn't sleep. He is now nearly four and still not a great sleeper. Coffee (and carbs) became the only way to get though the day. I'm better at the carbs, but making a pot of coffee and sitting down with a cup is a vital part of the writing ritual.
What stands in my way? Stuff. Life. Paying work (I'm a freelance copywriter), that needs hours of time and attention. Children. Housework. Facebook. Twitter. One can always find time, even if it's at 11pm, but keeping enough clear headspace can be a challenge.
Writing novels is officially the most fun I have ever had with my clothes on. There is nothing I would rather do. Sometimes there are parts of the job (line-editing for example), that can be tedious, and going over and over the same manuscript can make you lose the will to live, but I try not to lose sight of the miracle that I am actually a published novelist, and what a joy the whole thing is.
As for being blocked, a friend who is a journalist once said rather sniffily, "There's no such thing as writer's block", and I think for hacks like him and me, that's true. I write every day for a living, and I have for twenty years. I have to produce or I don't get paid. I take that "Dammit, get something... anything on the page" attitude into my novel writing. As long as you keep going, things tend to resolve themselves."
Where do you most like to be when you write and do you have a routine?
"I usually write at my desk at home, in our living room. My husband is an IT engineer so I have a good PC with a massive monitor. My desk (pictured) is always a mess though, piled with papers, pens, and often toys that three-year-old Ted has brought to me as I sit there. When I need a change, I find it hugely useful to go to a coffee shop to write, although I abhor this new-fangled modern tradition of offering Wi-Fi everywhere. The best reason to write in a coffee shop (besides the good coffee), is to avoid procrastinating and surfing the Net. I am quite superstitious about the coffee shops where I've done good work and love to go back there - the Caffe Nero in Edgware is a total winner. I also did some fabulous work in the little cottage in Cornwall where we had a holiday in March. Breath-taking sea views, peace... and zero Internet (seeing a pattern here?)
I tend not to play music, but I am quite oblivious to noise, happy to write while my family watches TV or chats. I can tune it out.
Like most writers, I also have to work, and I have to care for a three-year-old, so I carve the novel-writing hours out day by day. Sometimes I'm lucky and get to work in the morning when Ted is at nursery, but more often than not, I won't get to write till he's in bed. When doing a first draft, I write 1200 words a day, every day, no exceptions."
Is there a collaborative element to your writing process?
"I write alone, but my husband Tom is an utterly invaluable support. He brings drinks to me when I am writing late at night, listens to me wrestle through plot points, makes great suggestions and loves me though every stage. I'm proud to say Wonder Women is dedicated to him, because it wouldn't have been written without him.
Also, with any book, you end up writing about things you know nothing about, and people are always so amazingly helpful. From the woman who talked me through her children's clothing business to the friend who told me about studying at Goldsmith's in the 1990s, and the colleague of my husband's who helped me choose an authentic Indian Hindu name for a character, I salute them all."
Please share a special object that connects with your writing.
"This is my quartz slab, which I use as a coaster for the ubiquitous coffee cup. It comes from a happy family trip to the Natural History Museum. I think it's beautiful, and it is the same colour as the amethyst in my engagement ring. So to me it stands for love, connectedness, family, and coffee. Yup. That's all the important stuff."
Which other creative art form outside the one you are known for do you wish you could master?
"Here's my secret wish... I wish I could dance. I am five foot ten and clod-hoppingly clumsy. I started ballet and dance at sixteen, much too old to gain any real skills, and while I did it at university, was never any good at all. But in my dreams... oh, in my dreams I am a petal on the wind, or a petal in Artem Chigvintsev's arms when I get to go on the writers' only version of Strictly Come Dancing. Seriously though, I do still do some acting (amateur only), when I get the chance, and I sing in a choir. And I love to cook."
How did becoming a parent affect your creativity?
"Bloody children. Time-thieves the lot of them. And heart thieves. And teachers of wit and emotion, and challengers of patience... On a practical level, being a parent makes creating much harder, just because I have less energy and time than I might have as a non-parent. But on a visceral level, I think it makes me a better writer than I would have been. My sons (Matt who is 20 and Ted who is 3), made me into a grown up. I believe they made me a less selfish, more compassionate and better version of myself, and that gives me more depth and experience to write from. Then they stole all my sleep and most of my waking hours. Sigh."
What are you working on next?
"I am maybe halfway into a first draft of a new book, tentatively titled Were Those the Days. It's about memory and nostalgia, about the narratives we create around our past, and how we use those to define ourselves and our present. But what if the people from your past come to get you, and those people don't remember things in quite the same way? And what if what you believed in for all those years was just plain... wrong?"
You can find out more about Rosie on her website www.rosiefiore.com Twitter @rosiefiore and Facebook Rosie Fiore.
Wonder Women, published by Quercus, is available now on Kindle.